This year we have a severe problem wih biting mosquitoes in our garden. I have established that the large numbers are not breeding in our water butts. However, I have seen a few egg rafts on the surface of the water. This type of raft is characteristic of Culex the common biting species in the UK being C. pipiens.
They were photographed through my Kiron 105mm macro, fitted with the matched x1.5 Kiron Matchmate TC. I mostly set f8 but I also tried f5.6 for the overhead shots. Exposures were 1/40 or 1/50 at ISO 1600, hand-held, with some support from the edg of the tank.
Cropped by ca 50%:
Cropped by ca 70%:
The raft was failry static most of the time. However, whenever I got my lens within range and started to focus, one a number of black flies flying erratically, a foot of so above the surface, would dive and hit the raft, causing it to rotate horizontally. They seemed to show little interest at other times. These, about half housefly size, are the irritating flies of the topic title.
Even the best of these lateral images are a bit soft and I have had to make them rather contrasty to show detail.
Harold